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Radium Hot Springs, BC 153.2 km (95.2 mi) |
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It’s time for a Kootenanny, everyone!
Today, the forecast is nothing but clouds and rain, so we’ve made the decision to get real wet! Motoring out of camp, we headed into town, where two school buses were lined up in front of Kootenay River Runners, ready to take a whole slew of folks on a rafting adventure!
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To get to the launch point on this bright blue river, we headed about 35 minutes north of Radium Hot Springs and cut in on a super muddy, wildly bumpy dirt road, really a mud road, for about twenty minutes! Since that particular road was shared by a magnesite mining company, we had to pull over and let some trucks pass a few times, but that gave us a chance to hold a piece of magnesite and learn about this rare mineral deposit, one of the purest in the world! Magnesite isn’t named for any kind of magnetism but for being a magnesium ore! It doesn’t hold heat, which makes it valuable for lining hot water pipes, and its magnesium content makes it useful for fertilizers, fiberglass, and even vitamins for livestock feed! Anyway, shortly afterward, we all unloaded from the buses to stand in the rain and assemble our whitewater equipment!
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After getting into groups and learning the basics of rafting safety, like how you need to dunk someone before lifting them back on the raft so their buoyancy helps you lift them back aboard, we set off onto the river, hauling the raft over a gravel bar and heeding the commands like “full forward,” and “left paddle” to keep us from being in trouble with the Class II and III rapids! It was a good thing to be able to concentrate on paddling because it had been a steady, cold rain since we got off the buses! After two and a half hours of drizzle and splash, we were all feeling pretty cold and damp!
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Thankfully, the crew came prepared with hot coffee and cinnamon rolls, which they unpacked and laid out for us to warm up! They even provided extra fleece layers in case anyone under packed for this trip. It was just the right kind of break in the chill to get us ready for the next leg of our adventure!
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As we went, we learned about how trees on steep banks grow up, even if they start growing sideways, as a way to reduce strain on their roots. We also learned that rivers like this one create safe eddies for swimming and deadly holes, which create vertical currents that can suck a boat or a person right down into the depths! We heard a story about one river runner who tossed a paddle into a hole and never saw it again!
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But that was not our fate today! The guides were skilled enough to bring all three rafts safely into shore at our pullout point. Everyone traded their waterproof gear for their original clothes, then piled onto the buses for a super bumpy ride back to the main road. While this warmed us up a little, we still had to take a dip in the hot springs for which this town gets its name. A good hour’s soak in the thermal spring put us right back in equilibrium!
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From there, we left Radium Hot Springs behind and motored north to our new jumping-off point at the base of Beaverhead Peak! While I couldn’t see the resemblance, I also couldn’t handle staying outside too long. This was where all the mosquitoes had been waiting for us! Thousands of them! Millions of them! They were everywhere, and they were ferocious!
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So, long story short, we made dinner in the motorhome and did not explore the Golden Riverfront Campground, which was otherwise very neat with a huge shower house we just couldn’t use. We’ll need all the warmth and all the red blood cells we can get, because tomorrow, we’re going glacier walking!
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Yes folks, we picked this campground to be closer to the Athabaskan Glacier, part of the Columbia Icefield, and first thing tomorrow, we’re going to go walking on ice. Stay tuned!
See ya later, icy glacier!
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Total Ground Covered: 427.0 km (265.3 mi) |
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